


Blood and Sweat, Flesh and Bone

by dashakay



Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-17
Updated: 2009-11-17
Packaged: 2017-10-03 04:21:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dashakay/pseuds/dashakay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He is the only one among 41,422 human beings who calls her Laura, and not Madam President. And nothing turns her on more than hearing him say her name.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Blood and Sweat, Flesh and Bone

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to icedteainthebag for incredible beta and even better friendship.

She's buzzed through and through, every nerve in her body alive and dancing, as if she'd been one of those young bodies up there in the ring. Truthfully, she envies the pilots and crew, envies their lithe grace and cutting right hooks, their firm muscles and determined glares. She even envies Bill, how he had the nerve to get in the ring with Tyrol, at least thirty years his junior, chubby but hopping with energy and verve, daring to strike the admiral of the Colonial Fleet.

Bill is on her arm, limping slightly, his face smeared with blood. He looks like he had a hot date with the business end of a windshield. She knows it will be hours before she sleeps. She's as keyed up as she was in college, pulling all-nighters with bad, sludgy coffee and the occasional dose of stims.

Doc Cottle intercepts them on their way out. "Admiral, do you want me to take a look at those cuts?" The one above Bill's left eyebrow looks particularly bad. "You could probably do with a stitch or two."

Bill clutches an icepack to his face. "I'll be fine," he grunts. "I've been beat up worse before."

She knows he doesn't want to be treated differently than any of the other boxers. He's not a man on the wrong side of middle age; he's just one of the fighters.

"Suit yourself," says Cottle, shrugging and lighting a cigarette.

Tory is next to waylay them, just down the corridor. "Madam President, the shuttle to Colonial One is leaving in five minutes."

She doesn't want to return to her silent quarters. She doesn't want to sleep. "I need to have a word with the Admiral, Tory. You all can return without me."

Tory struggles not to show any expression on her face. Laura can actually see the muscles twitching under her skin.

Everyone must have known on New Caprica. It was a small town; tongues wagged endlessly for entertainment. People must have noticed that the Admiral came down for shore leave every few weeks, always bunked in the former president's tent. She didn't care then. She was a civilian; she was nobody, just a schoolteacher.

Tory has the good grace to simply nod her head and bustle her way down the hallway, a clipboard clutched to her chest.

Laura tips her head back and laughs. "Oh, the gossip that'll spawn!"

Bill merely nods his head, clearly lost somewhere else. This is what she wants to talk to him about.

They reach his quarters after an eternity of slow walking. The blood has mostly dried on his face—it's a macabre look with his glasses on top of the brick red rivulets and splotches.

"Coming in for a drink?" he says.

"Of course." She straightens her spine and enters through the hatch. She goes straight to the head and wets a hand towel.

He has unbandaged his hands, the white strips scattered across the coffee table. Bill hands her a glass of amber brandy and she gives him the cloth in return. At least he doesn't seem to be actively bleeding any longer.

It feels like a long time since she's settled on his sofa and kicked off her heels, flexed her toes. This is the only space in the fleet, outside of her own quarters, where she can breathe. Where she doesn't have to be President of the Twelve Colonies and can simply be Laura. First name only.

Which is part of the problem, when you get right down to it.

"So, what business did you have in mind?" Bill asks, his voice clipped, professional. He dabs at his face, the towel coming away spotted in dark red.

She swallows some brandy. It warms her stomach. She wants to talk about his speech, his motivation for it. She wants to talk about so many things, actually.

It's been almost a year and a half since New Caprica.

She can hardly remember his taste, his smell, the touch of his hand on the small of her back.

She crosses her legs, well aware that she has a very nice set of legs. The gods may not have been terribly generous in the breast department, but they made up for it with her legs. When she wears a skirt and crosses her legs, she knows his eyes will follow. Surreptitiously, of course, but his eyes always travel her legs from ankle to the hem of her skirt.

"It's not important," she murmurs, half into the glass. In fact, she can't remember what was so pressing. Something about a speech and worrying. She touches his face. "Do you have a first aid kit? We should get your face fixed up."

Bill chuckles. "Wouldn't want to mar my flawless visage—" He stands up, stifling a groan as he does.

She takes off her jacket and lays it carefully on the back of a chair. She rolls up the sleeves of her blouse as if she means business, as if she might be climbing in the ring momentarily.

He sits down on the toilet seat. She opens the small white box he's handed her. Inside are bandages and a bottle of antiseptic fluid. She finds a clean-looking washcloth and wets it.

"You really did a number on yourself," she comments, pretending not to notice how he winces at the touch of the cloth to his bruised skin. "What were you trying to prove?"

"Laura," he says, in a voice that's clearly warning her. "Can we not talk about this right now?"

"Fine," she says, rinsing out the cloth and watching the eddying water in the sink turn an angry pink. She returns to leaning over him, trying to get the last of the blood off his face without hurting him more. The cut over his eye seems to have stopped bleeding, thank the gods.

It's been a long time since she's been this close to him. She feels his warm breath on her cheek as she mops up blood from his neck and behind his ear. So close, but she's been closer before. She's tried hard to forget, but her stubborn brain now is able to recall how it felt to have him deep inside her, to hear him gasp her name as he came.

She squirts on some antiseptic, applies a butterfly bandage to the cut. "Am I hurting you?" she asks. He's so close. She can smell his sweat, the iron of his blood.

She's never stopped wanting him. Never, not even when she sat down with him after the New Caprica exodus to discuss agenda items 1-5 and, finally, secret item #6: Why It's a Conflict of Interest for Us to Be Romantically and Sexually Involved.

"Laura," he rasps, his hand sliding up her forearm.

He is the only one among 41,422 human beings who calls her Laura—not Madam President. And nothing turns her on more than hearing him say her name.

She feels his eyes on her, those blue eyes that miss nothing. She doesn't want to meet his eyes because then she'll be lost. She knows it as well as she knows her own name.

One more dab with the washcloth and he's cleaned up, discounting some bruises, a gash over his eye, a swelling ear and upper lip. "There," she says with finality.

Time to put her jacket back on, leave and see if she can hitch a ride back to Colonial One.

Bill tightens his grip on her forearm. "Laura," he says.

"I need to leave." She feels him tugging her blouse from the waistband of her skirt, his warm hand sliding up her cool back.

Oh.

She's so sick of it, sick of denying that she's anything more than the president. It's too easy to forget that she's a woman, that she wants to be touched, she wants to make love, she wants to be called by her first name.

His eyes are fixed on her, she can feel them. His fingers travel to her blouse, clumsily working the buttons.

She's sick of pretending she doesn't want him.

Carefully, she kisses him, not wanting to hurt him. Brandy and blood in her mouth, his tongue so alive against hers. She doesn't want to admit to herself how many times she's secretly touched herself, thinking about drunkenly kissing him under the New Caprica stars.

His neck is salty with sweat under her tongue. She hears him gasp as her tongue traces the line from ear to collarbone.

She wants him. She won't pretend any longer, at least not tonight.

The head is small and they should probably take this somewhere more comfortable, but she also doesn't want to move, because that would give her time to have second thoughts. "Just this one time," she whispers in his ear. She removes her glasses and sets them on the counter.

"Just this one time," he repeats, his voice sounding thick.

She manages to get his tanks off him and tosses them somewhere in the direction of the doorway. Bruises are starting to form here and there on his chest, surrounding the ugly scar that bisects him. She loves the history of his scars, the stories they tell of his survival—and the survival of the human race.

There's just enough room for her to kneel down between his legs. Her fingers have a hard time unbuttoning and unzipping his trousers. Her hands are shaking, just a little. He mumbles something incoherent as she frees his cock from the fly of his underwear. She's already wet just thinking about taking him into her mouth.

Bill's cock is just like the rest of him, not too long, but thick and sturdy. She twirls her tongue around the head, enjoying the taste of the salty drops at the tip. His fingers bury themselves in her hair as she begins licking and sucking him in earnest.

"Where did you get so good at this?" he moans, and she almost giggles, but she doesn't want to choke.

Funny how she can kneel at the feet of a man and still feel so powerful, so in charge. He's at her mercy now, and that fact turns her on more than just about anything. She can feel the muscles of his legs tense and hear his breathing quicken as she slides his cock in and out of her mouth.

"Lauuuuuura," he gasps. She almost comes at the sound of her own name.

Suddenly, he pushes her head away.

"What's wrong?" she asks, blinking up at him.

"I...I don't want to come yet," he says. "I want to be inside you."

"You want to be where?" she teases.

"Inside. You. Now," he says in his admiral's voice, pushing his trousers down to his ankles.

"As you wish, sir," she says, the giggles threatening to spill out of her.

She stands up and takes her time removing her clothes. She dangles her blouse off her fingers and he impatiently bats it away. Her bra ends up in the sink, she thinks. Bill takes care of her panties for her, pushing them down her hips with rough fingers. She manages to kick them away without tripping on them.

Bill's hands trace the curve of her waist and hips, squeeze each globe of her bottom. "Gorgeous," he says.

A flush rises in her cheeks.

"Inside you," he whispers, hot breath in her ear.

She swings one leg over him and guides him in with her hand. Oh, yes. She'd definitely forgotten how good it felt to have him filling her. There's nothing between them now.

He supports her back with his hands as she begins to move, slowly at first. She loves the tease of drawing her hips back and then taking the full length of him deep inside her in one thrust.

She can fully look into his eyes now that they've admitted their defeat. They gaze at her almost without blinking, as if he's afraid that she'll disappear if he closes them. "I missed this," he says.

"Me, too," she says. She moves faster now, grinding her pelvis into him. She feels the pressure building inside her clit as it brushes against him with each stroke.

Now she's losing control of conscious thought as he lightly pinches one of her nipples. How could they deny themselves this for so long? Such goodness, such delight. What was wrong with them?

She squeezes her eyes shut. She's so close now, so, so close. She can see it, just off in the distance. Burying her face in his neck, she feels the waves coursing through her, each one stronger than the last. "It's so gooooood," she hears herself moaning.

When she comes back into her body and opens her eyes, Bill is staring at her with a mixture of pride and amusement. "Oh, gods," she gasps, still feeling the aftershocks in her legs and her spine.

His hands are at her hips now, urging her on. Her thigh muscles are beginning to ache now from straddling him, but she knows this is no time to quit, not when he's so close. She moves faster, surprised to feel another orgasm building within her. I guess I've been saving it all up, she thinks with amusement.

Now it's Bill's turn to cry out, a hoarse howl that sounds like pain and pleasure at the same time. She's right there with him as a second set of contractions rips through her.

For a long moment, they merely clutch each other, breathing hard.

And then it occurs to her what a hilarious picture they must make. The admiral sitting on his toilet seat, bruised and bandaged, his trousers at his ankles and his shoes still on his feet. And the president straddling him, as naked as the day the gods allowed her to be born. Imagine if _that_ picture got out and circulated among the fleet.

She can't help it, she begins to laugh and laugh, until tears are streaming down her face and her stomach muscles hurt.

It's been a long, long time since she's laughed like this.

Somehow they both squeeze into his shower stall, blissfully hot water washing away sweat and blood.

Bill kisses her, long and slow. "Can you stay the night?"

"I thought we said just one time..." She tips her head back and lets the water spray on her face.

"I believe that the phrase 'one time' could be interpreted to mean an entire night," he says with a guffaw.

"You should have followed in your father's footsteps. You're good at parsing words."

He lightly smacks her ass and she laughs.

She kisses the rough skin of his cheek. "Bill, you need to understand something..."

His spine stiffens. "What's that?"

"The speech you gave tonight at the dance. You can't shoulder all the blame for what happened. For the choices you made. You're _human_."

"I'm the leader of this fleet," he says, scowling. "It's my job to shoulder the blame. People died, Laura, because we weren't ready."

She rubs soap into his chest. "I know, but you're going to have to make your peace with it and move on. We have a long, hard road ahead of us. I can feel it in my bones."

He nods.

"So," she says, striving for a brighter tone, "if 'one time' is interpreted to mean a whole night, what time does this night end? At 1200 hours? 0700 hours the next morning? We need to fully define our terms before we proceed."

Bill's chuckle is gratifying. "I'm not sure," he says, "but I suggest we repair to my rack to further negotiate."

END


End file.
